to mercy with the most touching eloquence over which he would
laugh heartily when his point was gained. He was often compelled to do
this during his theatrical management, when a troublesome creditor might
have interfered with the success of the establishment. He talked over an
upholsterer who came with a writ for L350 till the latter handed him,
instead, a cheque for L200. He once, when the actors struck for arrears
of wages to the amount of L3,000, and his bankers refused flatly to
Kelly to advance another penny, screwed the whole sum out of them in
less than a quarter of an hour by sheer talk. He got a gold watch from
Harris, the manager, with whom he had broken several appointments, by
complaining that as he had no watch he could never tell the time fixed
for their meetings; and, as for putting off pressing creditors, and
turning furious foes into affectionate friends, he was such an adept at
it, that his reputation as a dun-destroyer is quite on a par with his
fame as comedian and orator.

Hoaxing, a style of amusement fortunately out of fashion how, was almost
a passion with him, and his practical jokes were as merciless as his
satire. He and Tickell, who had married the sister of his wife, used to
play them off on one another like a couple of schoolboys. One evening,
for instance, Sheridan got together all the crockery in the house and
arranged it in a dark passage, leaving a small channel for escape for
himself, and then, having teased Tickell till he rushed after him,
bounded out and picked his way gingerly along the passage. His friend
followed him unwittingly, and at the first step stumbled over a
washhand-basin, and fell forwards with a crash on piles of plates and
dishes, which cut his face and hands in a most cruel manner, Sheridan
all the while laughing immoderately at the end of the passage, secure
from vengeance.

But his most impudent hoax was that on the Honourable House of Commons
itself. Lord Belgrave had made a very telling speech which he wound up
with a Greek quotation, loudly applauded. Sheridan had no arguments to
meet him with; so rising, he admitted the force of his lordship's
quotation (of which he probably did not understand a word), but added
that had he gone a little farther, and completed the passage, he would
have seen that the context completely altered the sense. He would prove
it to the House, he said, and forthwith rolled forth a grand string of
majestic gibberish so well imitated